Occupational Therapy

What is involved in Occupational Therapy?

The Association of Occupational Therapists Ireland explains that Occupational Therapy helps people to do the everyday things that they want to do and need to do when faced with illness, injury, disability or challenging life events.

The primary goal of occupational therapy is to enable people to participate in the activities of everyday life. Occupational therapists achieve this outcome by working with adults, children and communities to enhance their ability to engage in the occupations they want to, need to, or are expected to do, or by modifying the occupation or the environment to better support their occupational engagement.
(Adapted from the World Federation of Occupational Therapists, 2010)

• The unique focus of Occupational Therapy is on a child’s day to day life functioning or occupation. Occupational therapists use the term occupation to describe all the things we do to take care of ourselves and others; socialise and have fun; and work and contribute to society.
• Occupational therapists understand how sensory processing difficulties, illness, injury, disability or challenging life events can affect children’s ability to do the day-to-day things that are important for them. This may also involve gross and/or fine motor difficulties.
• By carrying out assessments and tailoring a programme that responds to the child’s unique situation and needs Occupational Therapy helps families to live their lives in a way that is meaningful and satisfying for them.

Occupational therapists have a broad education in the health, social, psychological and occupational sciences which equips them with the attitudes, skills, and knowledge to work collaboratively with people, individually or in groups, to bring about positive life changes. Occupational therapists work with people with a wide range of health needs, including those who have an impairment of body structure or function owing to a health condition, those who are restricted in their participation or those who are socially excluded owing to their membership of cultural minority groups. Occupational therapists work in many different practice settings including hospitals, day care facilities, nursing homes, schools, universities, community centres and workplaces. Many also work in private practice and provide occupational therapy in the client’s home or residential setting.

Occupational Therapy Assessments

An Occupational Therapy assessment involves:

• A parent and teacher questionnaire being sent to parents prior to the assessment to gather important pre-assessment information.
• May contain standardised and non-standardised assessment tools.  A range of standardised and non-standardised assessment tools will be used depending on your child’s age, ability level and specific difficulties.  During the appointment, the areas of motor skills and motor development, visual perception and visual motor skills, sensory processing skills and functional skills such as handwriting, typing, dressing, cutlery use etc. are explored according to what is appropriate for the individual child or young adult.
• Following the completion of the assessment, a report will be compiled detailing the assessments used as well as their outcomes. Recommendations and, if required, activity ideas will be included within the report.
• Prior to the report being posted to you, you will also receive verbal feedback over the telephone detailing the findings of the assessment.

The duration of an assessment is approximately 1 ½ – 2 hours. The prices includes the estimated time for the assessment; preparation and scoring of standardised assessments used; verbal feedback to you; and a full written report.

To book an Occupational Therapy Assessment, please log an enquiry through our enquires tab.